Comparative study between lumbar epidural and spinal anaesthesia in elective caesarean section: comparison of maternal status during operation and in the post operative period

Abstract

The caesarean section (C/S) is preferably done under regional techniques like spinal and epidural anesthesia. Both these techniques are also preferable to general anaesthesia which allows the mother to remain awake during caesarean delivery. After the approval of the institutional ethical committee, sixty (60) patients were equally divided into group-I (Spinal group) and ‘group-II (Epidural group). The intraoperative hemodynamic parameters (blood pressure & heart rate) and any event like nausea, vomiting, discomfort, shivering and the overall maternal satisfaction were compared between the groups. During post operative period mothers were interviewed for pain relief and choice of anesthetic technique. The mothers were also interviewed regarding their experiences of present anesthetic technique in comparison to the previous experiences. All data were analyzed statistically. The epidural group is significantly superior to spinal group in maternal satisfaction, frequency & magnitude of hypotension and postoperative pain relief. The hypotension that was needed to be treated with vasopressor was significantly different between the two groups (Spinal 33.33%, Epidural 10.00%, P<0.05). There is no significant difference between the groups regarding the analgesic requirement. The mothers of epidural group had chosen the technique and recommended this as the ideal technique for elective CS. But the time taken to start operation after the epidural anaesthesia was longer than spinal technique. The prolong onset to start the operation is an opportunity to make rapport between the mother and the anesthesiologist.

Journal of BSA, 2008; 21(2): 61-66